An initiative of the National Academy of Public ... · Oral History Program Series: Civil Service Interview no.: L11 Interviewee: Rose Sereste Interviewer: Daniel Scher Date of Interview:

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An initiative of the National Academy of Public Administration, and the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs

and the Bobst Center for Peace and Justice, Princeton University

Oral History Program Series: Civil Service Interview no.: L11

Interviewee: Rose Sereste Interviewer: Daniel Scher Date of Interview: 22 July 2009 Location: Gaborone Botswana

Innovations for Successful Societies, Bobst Center for Peace and Justice

Princeton University, 83 Prospect Avenue, Princeton, New Jersey, 08544, USA www.princeton.edu/successfulsocieties

Innovations for Successful Societies Series: Civil Service Oral History Program Interview number: L-11 ______________________________________________________________________


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SCHER: My name is Daniel Scher and I'm the Associate Director of the Innovations for Successful Societies project and I'm here with Director Rose Seretse of the Directorate on Corruption and Economic Crimes (DCEC) in Gaborone, Botswana. The date is the 22nd of July 2009. Ma’am, thank you very much for taking time out of your very busy schedule and to meet with me. I do appreciate it.

SERETSE: Thank you. SCHER: Before we begin, I wonder if you would mind just introducing yourself and telling

us a little bit about your career background and the position that you currently hold.

SERETSE: My name is Rose Seretse. I am currently 10 years working for the Director of the

Directorate on Corruption and Economic Crime. I started working here for the DCEC in 1997. That was after I had worked for the local authorities for a period of about six years. My background qualification is a degree in Construction Engineering and Management from Ferris State University in the US after which I graduated and started working for the local authorities as the technical officer responsible for construction projects. That was in 1991.

I moved to the Directorate on Corruption and Economic Crimes in 1997 where I started working mainly at corruption prevention in the construction industry. My focus was really looking at ways of preventing corruption in the construction industry, in the civil engineering industry. And I later moved on to another division within the directorate - a division of public education, which was also to educate members of the public on evils of corruption, and to solicit their support. I then moved to a third, another division, which was mainly the human resource and administration division where I was now responsible for the administrative aspect of the directorate on corruption until I moved to another division of performance improvement or Performance Management Systems (PMS) where I was now coordinating the performance improvement activities of the Directorate on Corruption. I was then appointed the deputy director in 2007 to 2009. A position that I held until the former director retired this year in April and I begin to hold the office of the director on an acting basis which is currently what I'm doing now.

SCHER: Okay. Excellent. So when you joined the DCEC in 1997, it’s my understanding it

was established in 199—. SERETSE: 1994. SCHER: 1994 okay. SERETSE: It was established in 1994. SCHER: Okay. So it was still a fairly new organization. SERETSE: New organization, yes. SCHER: And, I guess, trying to really carve out its place within the political and social and

economic sphere here. SERETSE: Yes.



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SCHER: And I wonder if you can talk a bit about those early days. You know, what, you know, how you went about trying to build support for the types of activities that you were engaged in when the institution was still quite new, and perhaps not so well known in the publics’ eyes.

SERETSE: Yes. At that time, though, the biggest challenge, like you say, was that the

organization was still fairly new. Not many people knew about it and it was only based in Gaborone. So it was really quite a challenge because we had to travel around the country educating people on, first of all, on the mandate of the Directorate. And also on explaining to them what corruption and economic crime really meant and what they can do to help the DCEC fight this scourge.

And, in 1997 an office was established in Francistown. So that also helped a bit because it, sort of, now, you know, gave the DCEC two areas of operation; one in Gaborone and one in Francistown. All though Botswana is, as you’d know it’ s a very large country that really you know, okay, provided some relief but still it meant a lot of traveling and it meant a lot of conversing for support.

And I must say that the Directorate was well received by members of the public because at that time when it was formed in 1994, it was after government had started seeing some trends of corruption. There was a scandal involving Botswana Housing Corporation in the 1990’s where tenders were awarded or bids were awarded corruptly. There was also a procurement of a primary schools consignment worth 91 million that also was awarded in a corrupt manner. There were some scandals involving the land, the allocation of land within Gaborone and the areas around Gaborone.

So that and a number of events that unfolded, government began to realize that there was a need to establish a full-fledged organization that will deal with the problem of corruption. So it was well received because people, or even the nation, had felt that, you know, there was - that was the time to really establish such an organization. So the support from the onset was quite a good one.

SCHER: I see, I see. Now, a major problem in setting up commissions, such as this one,

in many countries of the world is finding the right people to staff it. SERETSE: Yes. SCHER: And obviously you came with a very appropriate background coming from a, with

a degree in Construction Management, and then moving into corruption in the construction sector. So how did the DCEC go about finding people such as yourself and putting them into positions where they could really utilize their prior experience?

SERETSE: During the early days of the DCEC, the DCEC depended a lot on officers coming

from the police service on secondment. A good number of officers came joining the DCEC on secondment from the Botswana police and they chose to stay after some time, they didn’t go back. A few of them went back, but the majority stayed.

There was also as you might be aware, or you may not be aware, the DCEC is

modeled on the Independent Commissioner against Corruption (ICC) of Hong Kong. A number of expatriates who had previously served at the ICC in Hong Kong joined the DCEC. At that particular point in time, we had about 14 expatriates who mainly worked for the Independent Commission against Corruption. So that also came to boost the skills and the expertise.



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There was also a massive recruitment of graduates from the University of Botswana with various disciplines. The DCEC as you have rightly said is composed of, you know, officers with several backgrounds. You have people in accounting. You have people who were teachers before. You have people who were lawyers. You know we have all sorts of disciplines so as to cater for all the challenges that emerge when fighting corruption. So that’s basically the set up of the human resources.

SCHER: Okay, I see, I see. Botswana is renowned around the world for its relatively

lower levels of corruption especially when you look at some of the country’s neighbors. Obviously, you had some major scandals which prompted the establishment of this organization, but I wonder if you could perhaps reflect on why you think Botswana hasn’t succumbed to wide-scale corruption in the same way that many other countries in the region have?

SERETSE: I would say Botswana practices good governance, which I think is the

cornerstone in terms of fighting corruption. You know, all the three arms of government operate very independently from one another. You have the executive, you have the legislature, and you have the judicial, all independent from each other in maintaining checks and balances from one another. You also have the democratic setup. You know you have a strong media that really keeps government in its checks.

And you have every body really playing their part in making sure that things are

done in a transparent and open manner. And I think the one thing that really gives Botswana credit is the openness in which things are done especially at government level. You get into a government department, you can even ask for services to get an explanation of how things are done and the procedures that have followed. You get a thorough explanation of that. And we see transparency in our country, which is the key cornerstone that really has kept Botswana at a very low level of corruption.

SCHER: I see, I see, excellent. So one of the things that we’ve been looking at is public

sector, or civil service reform in countries around the world. And Botswana is quite interesting in that it has a very big public sector that’s really driving a lot the development and a lot of the activity. Now, traditionally, corruption can occur in the public sector because there are many avenues and many different things going on. I was wondering if you have any particular activities focused on reducing the incidence of corruption or reducing the opportunity for corruption within the public service itself?

SERETSE: Yes, we have a division; there are three divisions within the DCEC. One is the

Investigation Division, the Public Education Division, and then the Corruption Prevention Division. The Corruption Prevention Division is the one that is particularly focused on reducing corruption opportunities in government departments. What they do is that they will go into a government department after identifying the corruption-prone areas. They will go into a government department, they will study the systems, the procedures, the regulations, and the polices that operate in that government department to see if there aren’t any opportunities for corruption.

After doing that study they will come up with a very detailed report, a report which

they will submit to the management of the department identifying where the corruption opportunities are and even coming up with recommendations that spells out what can be done in order to close the loopholes or the corruption opportunities that would have been identified. A number of studies have been



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done. For instance, at the Department of Immigration and Citizenship, the Department of Roads, Transport and Safety, Department of Building and Engineering Services, you know, such departments that we could call corruption-prone departments. There are quite a number of studies that have been done in the area and recommendations have been made.

Right now, what we have started is a new concept; it is the Corruption Prevention

Committees. The Corruption Prevention Committees aim at identifying people within a department and educating them on corruption prevention studies and making those few people, maybe seven or eight, to form a committee that will now look at corruption opportunities within that department and then even come up with some strategies themselves because we believe that people who work at that department are better placed to see what is right or wrong better then even us, the DCEC, who would be coming as outsiders. So the Corruption Prevention Committees started operating last year and we are beginning to see the fruits.

SCHER: What was the thinking behind, or the reasoning behind establishing these

committees last year? SERETSE: It was after we had realized that, okay, we are fighting corruption as the DCEC,

but corruption is not one thing that can be fought by the DCEC alone. The involvement of the different ministries and departments are very critical and the ownership of the accounting officers within those departments and ministries are very critical in terms of fighting corruption. That is why we decided to come up with the concept of Corruption Prevention Committees. We had also seen it working very well in Tanzania and Kenya.

SCHER: I see. SERETSE: Yeah. SCHER: And just on this, the previous thing we mentioned about your officers undertaking

reviews of the ministries and identifying corruption-prone areas. How regularly do these take place?

SERETSE: Very - quite regularly. Like in a year, for instance, assuming that the division

itself is hampered by a shortage of manpower, like in a year, they will do about three departments.

SCHER: Okay. And then they make recommendations and—. SERETSE: Yes. SCHER: Do you have any authority to compel ministries to accept these

recommendations or to implement them? SERETSE: Yes. The Corruption and Economic Crime Act actually states that we can instruct

the department to implement our recommendations. We haven’t really gone to the point of instructing because we always do it on a more cordial basis. Yes, and we haven’t really met too much resistance. There has been some resistance here and there, but not to the extent that we had to instruct.

SCHER: I see. SERETSE: Yeah.



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SCHER: So, you must have quite good working relationships— SERETSE: Yes. SCHER: —with the ministry. SERETSE: We’ve established a good working relationship with the heads of the departments

and ministries. SCHER: And this is something that many countries struggle with. How have you gone

about cultivating this type of supportive relationship so that you’re not seen as sort of coming in and making demands and scrutinizing what’s going on but rather as a partner and making the ministry more efficient in what it does?

SERETSE: Yes, through collaborations such as through meetings we have sat together and,

you know, really talked about the need to work together to fight this scourge. The permanent secretaries who are the heads the ministries actually see the need for them to also fight corruption and through that it has become — and also with this Performance Management System because the Performance Management System is all encompassing. It’s even about how is your ministry, is your performance in all issues including in areas of fighting corruption. No head of an organization would want their ministry to be labeled as the most corrupt ministry. So every head is taking responsibility, because they don’t want to be seen, to be called the most corrupt ministry or the most corrupt department.

SCHER: Do you actually make rankings or —. SERETSE: We have a pie chart which tables the ministries according to the percentages to

say which ministry is leading in terms of the number of investigations that we have launched.

SCHER: Oh really. SERETSE: For instance, at the moment, the Ministry of the Local Government is the highest

at 29% in terms of the number of investigations that we’ve launched in that ministry. And it’s because of the nature of the ministry. It’s a very big ministry. It has a lot of social services. It encompasses local authorities and local authorities are really where the problem is.

SCHER: Yes, I see. It’s spread out across the country also. SERETSE: Yes. It is spread out across the country. SCHER: I see. So one of the things that I’m sort of wondering, so obviously, Botswana

has relatively low levels of corruption compared to other places. How does this affect your work? A lot of people I‘ve spoken to say, you know, corruption’s not a problem here. We don’t really have those sorts of problems. I mean, do you have any problem in making yourself, or making people aware that what you’re doing is exceptionally relevant and that the minute you start relaxing on these sorts of things that’s when it’s going to really grow?

SERETSE: In fact a lot of people now, I don’t know whether it because of the economic

recession or what but a lot of members of the public feel that corruption is all over the place. I mean, we even get calls that say, you know, we are just sitting there; there is corruption all over the place. The perception has gone up, is very high.



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People just think that wherever you go, you’re stepping on corruption and especially in the procurement and bidding process.

So, you know, it’s really keeping us on our toes, because we get a lot of reports.

Okay, some of the reports are anonymous. And anonymous reports make it very difficult to follow, but in any case we allow for anonymous reports. Some reports do have a lot of substance and they’re taken before a court of law. But in terms of the perception, the perception of corruption is quite high.

SCHER: Occasionally you must have to make decisions that could have political

repercussions or could offend people in high places. How do you instruct your officers to deal with perhaps unhappy politicians or unhappy government officials who are not pleased with the way things are going or the way that decisions have been made that may adversely effect them or implicate them?

SERETSE: The one fortunate thing for now, is that we haven’t really had any problems of

anyone thinking that we have stepped on their toe or anyone thinking that we have made decisions that, you know, contrast their interest, or—. We’ve been operating very freely and without any fear of victimization or anything like that. So, that just really worked for us. I don’t know if in the future, anything of that nature will come, but, you know, one just believes that the situation will stay as it is where we are allowed to operate professionally and independently - because we also do our work in a very professional manner. We don’t just, you know, take somebody to, or investigate someone just because we are told that they are corrupt or anything. We do our own preliminary investigations to see whether what we are doing is the right thing or not.

SCHER: I see, I see. So, in many other countries this type of work is extremely

dangerous. SERETSE: Yes. SCHER: And I’m sure here, even though to a lesser extent, your officers are still engaged

in work that could be risky. Do you take any particular steps or provide any particular advice to them to insure their own safety?

SERETSE: Yes, we do. We tell them to behave in a very professional manner, not to go

around, even after hours, bragging about working for the DCEC, and thinking that it’s something to be proud and to brag about, to conduct themselves. We emphasize on discipline, that they should conduct themselves in a highly disciplined manner because sometimes people expose themselves in their manner, by the manner in which they behave. So far, there haven’t been any threats.

SCHER: You mentioned a few countries that you’ve imported ideas and models from,

firstly, Hong Kong, the ICAC. You also mentioned Kenya and Tanzania. And I was wondering what are the forums that you go to look for new ideas and get fresh information about the types of initiatives that other countries are undertaking?

SERETSE: Okay. We attended the International Anti-Corruption Conferences. We attended

a global forum on corruption and even the world, the regional forums on corruption. We also do our own benchmarking exercises where officers just leave here to visit a country, to go and see how that country operates.



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SCHER: It’s interesting that you mentioned the ICAC model that the DCEC was based off because it’s my understanding that many other countries, around the same times, sort of mid to late 90’s, tried to, also, replicate the ICAC model. I know Zambia tried, Malawi tried, Kenya tried in the same time period. And yet, those didn’t fair quite as well as the DCEC has, and their reputations for integrity and actually making a difference were never quite established. And I wonder if you’re sort of familiar with these cases, and having been involved in the early days at that time, whether you can comment on what really made the DCEC a success where other countries that were trying to do similar things based on similar models, presumably with quite similar information, were not able to achieve the same level of success?

SERETSE: I think that the DCEC’s success has been really on political will. Because it’s one

thing to set up an anti-corruption agency, it’s another thing to be committed to it. And what I see from my own readings and my own observations is that some countries just set up anti-corruption agencies as a window dressing mechanism. Maybe because of the structural adjustment programs and, you know, to be seen to be doing something. But not that really they were committed to what they said they were doing. But with the DCEC, there has been a lot of political will and I think that has really kept us going.

SCHER: I see, I see. So you don’t, I mean, you are confident of the backing of the highest

levels of government in all the work that you undertake. SERETSE: Yes, yes we are. In fact, some of the initiatives that have been implemented by

ministers and government departments come from the president himself. SCHER: I see. SERETSE: Through the president’s initiatives. SCHER: There really is no substitute for good firm leadership from the top and support. SERETSE: Yes. Exactly, exactly, yeah. SCHER: One thing that I’m particularly interested in, and that I’ve heard quite a lot about,

is the introduction of Performance Management Systems firstly, in the various ministries of the public service itself. I’d like to, if you may, just talk a little bit about that, because I understand that a lot of these Performance Management Systems can actually be viewed as anti-corruption systems in terms of incentivizing productivity and de-incentivizing the inefficiency that corruption brings. I wonder if you have any particular thoughts on that or whether you’ve had any involvement or input into the implementation of these systems?

SERETSE: Yes, I strongly believe that it’s something that we have seen here, that

Performance Management Systems, when it’s up and running and being implemented fully, it’s an anti-corruption strategy. Because in Performance Management Systems the emphasis is on improving the systems, it’s on tightening controls, making sure that people are accountable for their deeds, you know, making sure that things are done in a transparent manner, making sure that things are done in the most effective and efficient way. And all this, they’re ingredients for anti-corruption, you know, accountability, controlling, internal controls, you know, putting measures in place that show effectiveness and efficiency, which are all part of the Performance Management Systems. So in Botswana, we’ve realized that the combination of the Performance Management



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Systems where even people are praised for their performance, is a good ingredient for fighting corruption.

SCHER: I see. And within the DCEC, you have implemented your, I mean, the same

performance management system that as been put into place. SERETSE: Yes. Rolled out to government, yes. SCHER: Would you mind talking a little bit about that, about how that has been

implemented here? SERETSE: Yeah. We produced a strategic plan. We came up with a strategy map for the

DCEC. We produced a balanced scorecard. We have periodic reviews on a quarterly basis, performance reviews on a quarterly base where we each present our review reports. Then we have the performance appraisals on a quarterly basis where officers are praised for their performance and that is something that is done throughout the entire public service.

SCHER: Obviously, as somebody who is very immersed in anti-corruption activities, you’re

very familiar with this idea that corruption is very difficult to define. And there are some very straightforward cases of corruption, but there are also things that are a little, little less, a little more difficult.

SERETSE: Gray, yes, gray areas SCHER: Yeah, gray areas. And also things that are, perhaps, more difficult to identify,

things like, say, nepotism. And I wonder how you go about trying to combat those sorts of corruptions? Say somebody hired, that sort of corruption, say somebody hiring his friend or his relative or - should I stop.

SERETSE: No. Just go ahead. In fact, have you seen our Corruption and Economic Crime

Act? SCHER: I haven’t taken a close look at it, no. SERETSE: Okay. I’ll find a copy for you. SCHER: Excellent. SERETSE: But, in terms of the Corruption and Economic Crime Act, yes, you are right,

corruption is very difficult to define. It’s just defined by way of giving examples in Section 23. But things like conflict of interest we do investigate and, you know, even prosecute for. If I sit in an equipment board where my sister is going to be interviewed in, even offered employment, as the DCEC, and I don’t declare my interests, it is something that I can be prosecuted for because that is conflict of interest.

There are certain areas where we find that this is purely mal administration - it’s

not corruption. In those cases we really - what we do is we refer them back to the departments to say we have received such and such a report, but according to us we realized that this is a matter that can be better dealt administratively by your department. Please investigate and give us feedback. Departments have done that, you know most of the time, with issues of promotions, issues of people complaining about unfair transfers, and things like that.



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SCHER: I see. It’s my understanding that in the late 90’s, early 2000, there was a very big decentralization process from the DPSM (Directorate of Public Service Management) to all the other ministries, so that a lot of the previously centralized control, controlled hiring and recruitment procedures were now spread out amongst all the ministries. I wonder if that process made your job, at least as regards these sorts of conflicts of interest and nepotism issues, more difficult because now instead of a centralized board, you have recruitment and promotion boards in all of the ministries.

SERETSE: Yes. The reports increased actually. SCHER: Yes. SERETSE: The reports increased especially of the, you know, unfair hiring practices,

nepotism, favoritism. I should say that, I’m not sure if you know about the Ombudsman?

SCHER: I do know him. SERETSE: Yes, the Office of the Ombudsman really handles those. They are mandated to

handle those. So some of them, when they come here, we refer them to the ombudsman. Some of the reports, when the Ombudsman receives them, he refers them to us.

SCHER: Okay, I see. It’s, it’s, did you take the increase in the number of reports as an

indication of an increase in the number of incidences or an indication of the increased, perhaps, transparency of the process and in which it was sort of easier to identify possible conflicts of interest when there were many different boards as opposed to just one?

SERETSE: I think at was in incidences, because you know African countries, Botswana

included, the rate of employment is still quite low. Unemployment is still on the high side. Okay, not high compared to other countries, but obviously we are still facing challenges of unemployment. If you read some of the reports, you can see that this was a situation where an aunt was trying to employ a niece, or, you know, an uncle was trying to employ a nephew, or a friend was trying to employ a friend. You know, mainly not because they wanted anything in return, bribe or anything. Just that, you know, “My niece is not working and I have to find employment for her and since now I’m the employment authority, I can be able to do that.” I mean, these are the types of reports we see. And I think it was just the opportunity that presented itself.

SCHER: I see. Was there in initial spike and then things leveled off? SERETSE: Then things leveled off, yes. Initially when it started, it was a bit high, but with

time it sort of just normalized. SCHER: Yes, normalized. That’s very interesting. One of the things I was wondering is,

you obviously have a lot of resources at your disposal, and personnel. Although you did mention that there were some manpower shortages. I wonder what are the types of things you feel you could use or would need to be able to do your job even more effectively? Is it, you know, more resources, more authority, you know, basically more manpower? What are the types of things that would make your job easier?



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SERETSE: Authority, we don’t have a problem with authority, because our Act is very clear. There, human resources are always a challenge, you know, manpower. I mean, we operate on a budget. And obviously, like any other government department, that you can never say that the budget is enough. You wish you could have more, but then you learn to do within your means. Yes.

But I’m happy because we, through the new National Development Plan, we’re in

the process of expanding both in terms of offices and also in the terms of the number of people.

SCHER: Are there any particular cost-saving measures that you have adopted or that

have worked out particularly well in terms of, perhaps, expanding your influence or expanding your reach at a relatively low cost?

SERETSE: The only one that I can think of is just the, you know, encouraging our officers not

to—because when you go on a trip, obviously you spend a night in a hotel. SCHER: Yes. SERETSE: What we have come up with internally is that we’ve encouraged our officers to

book in cheaper hotels. It’s a way of minimizing on the cost. And also to combine the trips. If an officer has a trip in Francistown, you know, they should, he should look around for people who are also going to Francistown so that they make one joint trip rather then having, you know, four or five vehicles following one another to Francistown.

SCHER: I see, I see. One thing that I’ve noticed in a few areas, advertisements for the

DCEC saying you can call this number or you can email this address and report to DCEC email address with any tips or whistle blowing type activities. In some countries this becomes quite a problem because when you open up to, open up these sorts of avenues to the public it can sometimes be abused with a lot of false claims being made, and sort unverifiable things that can take up officers’ time. How do you, or what has your experience been of opening up these avenues for the public communication?

SERETSE: It’s there in anonymous reports where we find ourselves sometimes having to run

around chasing a wild goose. But, it’s only so far as anonymous reports are concerned. But anonymous reports then are lower compared to reports where people identify themselves. Those are the instances where sometimes you go around trying to investigate. In the end we realize that we’re not heading anywhere. And then we close the investigation, but we would have started the process. But it’s mostly in anonymous reports.

SCHER: Okay, I see. In terms of reaching out to people in the rural communities, what

types of public education campaigns or activities are you engaged in outside of the capital and perhaps Francistown?

SERETSE: We, I don’t know if you are familiar with the concept of quarter meeting? SCHER: I am. SERETSE: You are. The public education conducts quarter meetings accompanied by

members. When a Member of Parliament is going to his constituency to talk about government projects, then they will normally send their schedule. The public education officer will be there. We also have the radio programs. We have the television programs. We have publications that we send out to the districts.



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SCHER: So it’s very comprehensive. SERETSE: It is. It is. We also have youth programs spread across the country. SCHER: That’s excellent. When you look back at your career here, and, you’ve obviously

been involved at various levels, what do you consider your biggest success to have been or the thing that you’re perhaps most proud of having accomplished?

SERETSE: The thing that I’m most proud of is the performance management. It was the

strategy plan of the DCEC. I pioneered it. It was during the time when I was a Performance Improvement Coordinator. I also saw to its implementation. During the time when the Performance Management System was being introduced in government, there were a lot of initiatives. You know we had to revise some of our operations. We had to come up with some of the conditions of service, even develop some of the, you know, things that determined our salaries and so forth. I was always, you know, involved in the forefront of those processes.

SCHER: I see. Sorry, I missed the point at which you were the Performance Improvement

Coordinator. Was that within the DCEC? SERETSE: Yes, it was within the DCEC. SCHER: Itself? Okay, I see. SERETSE: When performance management started, I was the Performance Improvement

Coordinator. SCHER: But you were already working at the DCEC. You were moved into—. SERETSE: Yes, yes, I was just moving from unit to the other. SCHER: Okay, I see. I’m very interested in these positions, because they sound to be

quite difficult; the Performance Improvement Coordinators in that you were the point person within the unit.

SERETSE: Yes. All the performance of the organization, yes. SCHER: Yeah, yeah. So, and it certainly sounds to me that the Performance

Management System, while extremely laudable in having very good effects, must have been quite difficult for the people who were expected to adopt it in that instead of doing things as they have always done them, they now have targets and goals and are expected to achieve a much higher level of productivity. So how did you go about selling that idea to the people within the DCEC?

SERETSE: It was tough, very tough I must say because it was a new concept. People are

not used to change. I mean, when somebody’s been doing something for the past ten years and you come up and say, “No, you need to change this thing and do it this way,” it wasn’t easy. So, you know, at first it was a bit frustrating. But I began to take units in smaller, or officers in smaller groups to get there by enough every process. Yeah before, I brought them in a larger group I would start small because you can’t really convince people in a multitude as opposed to when you take them in bits and pieces. So that’s how I managed. By the time I would call a big gathering, I would have already solicited support within the small units.



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SCHER: I see. I see. SERETSE: And also I used to call, because each ministry had its own performance

improvement coordinator, I’d bring in the performance improvement coordinators from other ministries, and I’ll go to—because they were facing the same problem that I was facing, I’ll remove here and go and speak at another ministry to convince those who are so—. And the Performance Improvement Coordinators of that time because we were the very, very first batch we worked very closely to one another and that really helped us.

SCHER: So, were you part of the original batch that were trained in Singapore? SERETSE: Yeah, we were the first batch. No I didn’t go to…I went to the US., to Portland,

Oregon. SCHER: Okay. SERETSE: There’s a performance center there. So we were trained there for about two

weeks. SCHER: And then while, so, and your idea behind calling in your colleagues from other

ministries and going there was to emphasize that it was the—? SERETSE: A national thing, yes. SCHER: And was that quite successful? SERETSE: It was very successful, very. SCHER: So, it wasn’t just— SERETSE: Because sometimes your, people, they don’t, they really take you for granted. SCHER: Yeah. SERETSE: But when you go out, or you bring in someone else, they tend to listen to that

person more then you. SCHER: I see, it certainly sounds like a very difficult position to be in, because on the one

hand you’re within the organization, but you’re still a little bit apart from it because—.

SERETSE: Yeah, yes. That’s why you have the reporting structure. Like right now, my

position here is the position of a permanent secretary, which is at ministry level. So as a Performance Improvement Coordinator, you don’t report to the people in between, you report straight to the man on top. That is how you become detached from the rest of the hierarchy, because you are expected to be there leading the organization.

SCHER: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I guess, at the same time, it’s sounds like a very innovative

and sort of necessary role. Because you can imagine without having a point person within the ministry, it would be very difficult to unroll these complicated systems. [end of file one]

SCHER: This is part two of the interview with Director Rose Seretse. We were just talking

about the Performance Improvement Coordinators being located sort of outside



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and reporting directly to the permanent secretaries. But sort of trying to imagine how you would try to implement a system without this person and how the Performance Improvement Coordinators were really the lynchpins for rolling out the—.

SERETSE: The performance improvement coordinator was really a person within the

organization, but like I said, they’re reporting straight to the highest man on top or the highest woman on top; he didn’t have to go through the hierarchy of reporting like with other officers. So yes, he was put in direct and in charge of all the units or all the departments within the organization.

SCHER: How did you get to be in that position? Did you put yourself forward as it or were

you selected? SERETSE: I was just appointed. SCHER: It sounds like a very tough job. SERETSE: It is. SCHER: But what I was going to ask, you said that this was your biggest success. I

wonder if you consider it a success because you saw actual improvements in the way that people were doing things?

SERETSE: Yes, I saw a lot of improvement. I saw a lot of turnaround, even in the manner in

which, you know, services were now - taking services to the people and the manner in which now officers were even conducting themselves. And even in achieving some of the things that we had asked from other government departments.

SCHER: Has it been difficult to sustain that level of productivity and turnaround? SERETSE: No not really, it hasn’t been. It sort of remained the same if not improved. SCHER: Is that because of the inbuilt system of reviews and targets? SERETSE: Yes because of the reviews and targets. SCHER: So there’s no real opportunity for standards to slide? SERETSE: No. There is a problem though with some people dragging—you know, the first

problem is that people don’t review on time. They always come up with excuses. Second even those who review sometimes, they’re not honest, they’ll give somebody a 95% or a 90%. When it comes to the time of promotion they will tell you that this person is not performing. Now when you look at the performance appraisal form, you see that the person was given 90%. So this is the inconsistency in the review process that has proved to be a challenge.

SCHER: But otherwise? SERETSE: Otherwise it is a very good system and it has worked well for us. SCHER: Well, I’m conscious of the various demands on your time and I was just

wondering if I could ask as a sort of wrap-up question, what advice you would give to your colleagues in similar situations in countries around the world. What is important for a director to know, a director of an agency such as this, what are



14

the ways in which he or she should act to really lead an organization to combat the scourge of corruption?

SERETSE: What I would say is that the director of an agency such as this should always be

on top of issues. You know within the divisions of the organization you have to know what is happening. You know it is like your path should be on every division within the organization to see what is going on and, you know, to sort of always have a plan ahead. Because corruption unfolds every day - different patterns. Nowadays we have money laundering, we have cyber crime, we have organized crime and you should always be planning ahead because criminals themselves are always, you know, one step ahead. If we are planning on this side, we are also planning on the other side. So it is very important that you don’t let your programs remain stagnant. They should always be reviewed periodically and make sure that you are keeping up with the pace such that you are not caught off guard.

SCHER: Excellent. Maybe one very final last question? SERETSE: Okay. SCHER: Future challenges. What do you see the major challenges that your organization

is facing? I promise this is my last question. SERETSE: The future challenge that I see is that corruption is taking a different shape on a

day-to-day basis. You know, corruption is no longer the type where I’ll come and say to you, give me fifty pula and you’ll get a passport, or if you do this for me in three days this is how much I’ll give you. No, no, no. It has become more complicated to the point that sometimes, you know, the evidence is very difficult and that is why it needs new strategies all the time because the paper trail also becomes very—you’ll see that, you know, on paper what it looks like, something was done aboveboard, perfectly, and yet a lot has gone wrong. So one needs to be strategizing on a daily basis.

And I see the challenge of money laundering becoming a monstrous challenge in

the future because of this computerized globalization and so forth where you can transmit money in a matter of seconds to the other side of the world.

SCHER: Excellent. SERETSE: One last question? SCHER: No, no, I won’t take any more of your time. I know you’ve got very important work

to be doing. SERETSE: Thank you very much. SCHER: Thank you very much, it’s been a very helpful interview for the work that I’m

doing and I really appreciate it. SERETSE: Okay, I’ll get you a copy of the DCEC Act.

Documents

An initiative of the National Academy of Public ... · Oral History Program Series: Civil Service Interview no.: L11 Interviewee: Rose Sereste Interviewer: Daniel Scher Date of Interview: